


Suki's Hamster

by transdimensional_void



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Non-Human Dan, Non-Human Phil, hamster - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-09
Updated: 2014-11-09
Packaged: 2018-03-25 23:05:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3828292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/transdimensional_void/pseuds/transdimensional_void
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Suki gets a pet hamster named Dan and learns some valuable lessons. (aka, an AU where Dan is the hamster and Suki is the human)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Suki's Hamster

When Suki woke up that morning, she immediately knew this was going to be the best day ever. For the first few seconds after waking, she couldn’t quite remember why she was so excited, and then it hit her — today was her birthday! She was turning twelve, and tomorrow there was going to be a big party with friends and cake and maybe even a little dancing, if she could talk her friends into it.

But that wasn’t the only reason she was excited. For as long as she could remember, Suki had been begging her parents to let her get a pet. Oh, sure, they had Rufus, a sweet old mutt that had been in the family longer than she had, and Suki loved him to bits. But as much as she loved feeding and playing with him, Rufus wasn’t hers. In fact, he seemed to love her dad most of all and could often be found with his head in his lap, or lying at his feet.

What Suki had always wanted was something to love and care for that was all her own — a pet that she would pick out, and name, and feed, who would love her best of all. And now that she was turning twelve, her parents had finally agreed that she could get one. They’d given her the good news one month ago, to give her plenty of time to decide what kind of pet she wanted, though she’d dreamed of it for so long, she barely needed one second to give her answer.

“Can I get a hamster?” she’d cried, her hand flying up to her mouth in a nervous gesture.

“Of course you can, sweetie,” her mother had said, and Suki had actually squealed she was so excited. She cringed a little in embarrassment, remembering that, but the feeling didn’t stick around for too long. Her mum was taking her to the pet store that very afternoon, as soon as she returned home from school, and she thought she might die of anticipation before then.

She pushed aside the duvet, hopped out of bed and rushed off to get started on her day with a grin that couldn’t even be dimmed by the cloudy weather outside.

***************************

“Oh, how about that one, Suki. She looks very energetic,” Suki’s mum was saying, one long, red-nailed finger pointing to a glass case on their right.

Suki rolled her eyes and sighed.

“Mu-um, that one’s a gerbil. I said I wanted a hamster.” Geez, it was like her mum didn’t even listen to her sometimes.

“All right, all right. No need to get snippy, Miss.”

Suki suppressed another sigh and hurried her step. The hamster cages were just ahead, and a fizzy gush of excitement had welled up in her chest at the sight.

She’d done her research over the past month, so it only took her a few seconds to zero in on the glass tanks containing the Syrian Hamsters. They were the biggest of all of the breeds and had the brightest coloration. She’d always imagined owning a big, orange hamster with bright, black eyes. There were several that fit that description, and she began looking them over closely, thinking that she would just know which one was hers the minute she saw it. She looked at one, a small male, that sat in the corner of its cage nibbling a sunflower seed. Hm, no. Not him. She turned to the next one, larger and female, who was happily running on her wheel. But she didn’t seem quite right either. Suki looked at the next one and the next one and the next one, but none of them seemed to be the right one. She began to worry. What if there wasn’t a right one?

Her eyes drifted over a few more of the large Syrians, but none of them really caught her eye. Suki frowned. What if her hamster was in a different shop? Were there any other pet shops in town? And, if there were, would she be able to convince her mum to take her?

She turned around to check on her mum and saw that she was cooing over a couple of chinchillas. Clearly her and her mother’s taste in pets differed.

As she turned back toward the hamster cages, something suddenly caught her eye. Down on a lower shelf, almost at the level of her feet, were a few cages containing dwarf hamsters. During her research, she’d dismissed them as an option, after discovering that they were mostly dull brown and grey in color. What caught her eye now was a cage occupied by two, tiny hamsters, cuddled together in a back corner of the cage. Suki knew that keeping hamsters caged together was generally a bad idea, as it caused stress and occasionally led to cannibalism. Perhaps these two were a breeding pair?

She knelt down to get a better look at them, and as she watched they crept forward from their corner and toward the food dish laid out near the front. “Campbell’s Dwarf Hamster, Male” the label on their cage read. Two little fluff balls were now stood each on one side of their shared food bowl, one munching on some kind of dark green leaf while the other bit into a large seed. The one on the left, with the leaf, was a soft, earthy brown tone, while the one on the right had a coat so dark a grey it was almost black. As she watched them, she heard footsteps behind her and then a man’s voice.

“Is the young lady interested in her very own hamster?”

Thinking she was being addressed, Suki looked around, only to find that the man was speaking to her mother, who had also walked up behind her. The man was short and round and dressed in some kind of uniform that made her guess he was an employee.

“Yes, I think we’re planning on buying a hamster today. Isn’t that right, Suki?”

The two adults turned their gaze upon her, making her suddenly feel flustered and out-of-place.

“Yes,” she mumbled, not quite able to meet the stranger’s curious gaze.

“Interested in our Campbell’s dwarfs, are you? The dwarf hamsters have been very popular recently. Much friendlier than Syrian, you know — well, friendlier to their own kind, I should say. They probably like humans about equally.”

“Oh,” Suki said, turning back to look at the two hamsters in the cage. The grey one had finished his seed and was now retreating into the little plastic hutch at the back of the cage, but the brown one still stood, quickly gnawing away at the edges of its leaf. “Is that why these two are together in one cage?”

“Yes, yes. In general, hamsters are pretty lonely creatures, but those two seem to tolerate each other all right.”

“Do you like those tiny, floofy things, sweetie?” her mum asked.

Suki turned back to the cage and saw that the brown hamster had also finished his snack. Unlike the grey one, though, he stayed stood where he was. As she watched, he leaned back a little on his haunches, cocked his head to one side and looked at her.

His eyes were so small and round and dark, and they seemed to glint significantly at her in the over-bright fluorescent light of the pet shop. And that’s when Suki knew that he was the one for her.

********************************

The whole car ride home, Suki was so excited she couldn’t stop talking.

“Or how about Marshall? Do you think Marshall is a good name for a hamster, Mum?”

“Mm-hmm,” her mother said, her eyes locked on the car in front of them, and Suki was so happy she wasn’t even bothered that once again her mother didn’t really seem to be listening to her.

“Except I knew this boy named Marshall in grade 4 who was hands-down the smelliest boy I’ve ever known. So I think if I named him that, my hamster might end up smelly too, don’t you think?”

“Mm-hmm,” her mother said.

“So I should probably name him after someone nice, and then he’ll be a nice hamster.” Suki paused to consider all the nice people she knew. There was Alanna, her best friend at school. She could name the hamster Alan, in honor of her, but then she thought of having to explain that to Alanna and blushed. No, that was no good. Her dad’s name was Richard, and her dad was the nicest man she knew. Maybe she could name him Rick, or Ricky, or Rich? Hm, but none of those names seemed quite right either. Maybe naming him after someone she knew personally wasn’t a good idea. How about…?

“I know!” she cried, startling her mother into actually turning and looking at her — though only for a moment, as she was still driving the car.

“Have you decided at last?” Mum said.

“Yes, because Harry Potter is my favorite series in all the world, and my favorite character too.”

“So you’ll name him Harry?”

“No, no, Harry is kind of a silly name, don’t you think? I’m going to name him Dan, after Daniel Radcliffe.”

“Oh,” her mother said. Suki looked back to the back seat of the car where her new pet hamster sat nibbling something in the corner of his cage.

“Dan the hamster. I think it really suits him!”

“Mm-hmm,” her mother said.

When she got Dan home, the first thing Suki did was clear a space on the top of her desk and begin setting up his cage. With the budget her parents had given her for purchasing her pet and providing for his needs, plus the birthday money she’d gotten from her grandparents, she had managed to buy not only a cage but several cool accessories. These included an external wheel and a plastic tunnel that screwed into one side of the cage and led to a blue plastic loft that perched atop it.

Once it was all set up and she’d checked his food and water about five times, Suki sat back and just watched as Dan crawled about his new living space, exploring all the nooks and crannies. She didn’t realize how many hours had passed with her just sat staring at him until a knock on the door and her mum’s voice made her look up and notice it had grown dark out.

“Suki, it’s almost time for dinner. Will you wash up and then come help me set the table?”

She wanted to protest that today was her birthday, and that it was so unreasonable to expect her to do actual chores on her birthday, but she was still just so giddy that instead she jumped up from her desk chair and happily headed for the door. It was hard tearing herself away from her new pet, but she knew he was well provided for. She had made sure of that.

On her way out the door, she turned to give him one last look-over, saw that he was exploring his loft, smiled, and then on impulse blew him a kiss before following her mother down to the kitchen.

********************************

She didn’t manage to convince any of her friends to dance at the party the next day, but that was okay. Everyone was too distracted watching Dan putter about his cage anyway.

“I didn’t know hamsters could be that tiny,” one girl had said upon being shown the new pet.

“He’s the cutest thing ever!” one of the boys had added.

“Why did you name him Dan, though?” her best friend, Alanna, had asked, but Suki just shrugged and said the name seemed to suit him. She could tell Alanna all about her reasoning later when it was just the two of them, but for now there was no way she was going to profess her love for Daniel Radcliffe in front of half her grade.

“Won’t he get lonely, all by himself?” a quiet girl named Sarah chimed in. She was eyeing the cage with concern. The little, brown hamster was still for the moment, curled up on a pile of wood shavings in the corner, and Suki had a sudden memory of the grey hamster he had previously shared a cage with. But she brushed the thought aside.

“No, hamsters are loners. If you make two hamsters live together, they eat each other!” she said. She knew that was a slight exaggeration, but the horrified reactions of her friends more than made up for the tiny fib.

Later that evening, after everyone but Alanna had gone home, Sarah’s question popped back up in Suki’s mind. She and Alanna were sprawled on her bedroom floor, bingeing on leftover cake and YouTube videos. When the next video ended, she rolled over on her back, and said in a thoughtful tone,

“I wonder if my parents would let me get another hamster right away.”

Alanna propped herself up on one elbow to face her, scrunching up her face in a frown.

“I thought you said they’d eat each other,” she pointed out.

“Yeah, I know,” Suki answered. “But when Dan was still at the pet store he shared a cage with another hamster, and the guy at the shop said they got along.”

“Oh. I don’t think your parents would want to pay for another pet so soon.” Alanna was always very practical about these sorts of things. Suki knew she was right, but as she looked over at Dan in his cage, she felt uneasy. He was once again curled up on the pile of shavings in the corner, and it struck her that she hadn’t seen him move from that spot for hours. Was it normal for a hamster to stay still for so long? Maybe he was simply tired. He’d just been through a big transition, after all, moving from the pet shop into her house. She should give him some time to adjust first.

That night, after she and Alanna had finally come down from their sugar high enough to fall asleep, Suki suddenly woke to some strange, rustling noises.

The room was dark, and she was still disoriented from sleep, so it took about thirty seconds for her to pin down the source of the sounds. When at last it dawned on her that it was just Dan moving about in his cage, she felt an overwhelming sense of relief. Hamsters were nocturnal creatures, after all. He’d probably just been sleeping earlier so that he could be awake now. She smiled a little before drifting off to sleep again.

She was shaken awake some hours later by Alanna’s hand on her shoulder.

“Suki! Suki! Wake up!” the other girl was saying. It was far too early in the morning for anyone to be so loud and energetic. She was on the verge of telling her friend as much, when Alanna added, “Dan is gone!”

That had Suki out of bed in no time. She sprang straight for the hamster’s cage, and sure enough the plastic lid lay a-tilt atop it, the lounge knocked askew, and a trail of wood chips led from the side of the cage toward the back of the desk.

Suki dropped to the floor at once, where she was swiftly joined by Alanna, and the two girls began a frantic, crawling search, beginning at the back of the desk and working along the floorboard, under the bed, behind the wardrobe, any small, dark space that a burrowing creature like a hamster might feel at home.

After five minutes, they still hadn’t found him, and the panicky feeling within Suki was rising. What if he’d escaped her room? What if Rufus had got him? She gulped. What if he’d left the house entirely? Could hamsters survive running wild in the suburbs? 

Her heart fluttering wildly in her chest, Suki went back to the desk and began re-tracing the hamster’s trail once more. From the line of wood shavings, she could tell that he had crawled down the back of her desk. There were a few more wood shavings there, but not enough to show which way he had gone after. To the right of the desk was her bed, and to the left a bookshelf. She made a guess and decided that he had probably chosen to go left. After all, if she were escaping from someone, she wouldn’t crawl toward that person.

She let her gaze drag along the floorboard and then inched over toward the bookshelf to peek behind it — and there he was, wedged in between the edge of the shelf and the floorboard, nibbling at the carpet.

“Dan, you naughty thing,” she breathed.

“You found him?” Alanna shrieked from the other side of the room where she had been inspecting the gap under the door to determine if it was wide enough for a hamster to fit through.

“Yes, he’s here behind the shelf, but keep your voice down. I don’t want to startle him.”

Alanna tiptoed over to where Suki crouched by the bookshelf, and after a half hour of coaxing and chasing and moving the bookshelf, Suki finally managed to scoop Dan up and slip him back into his cage.

The two girls breathed a sigh of relief and then collapsed on the floor, worn out by the stress of almost losing the hamster. After a while, Alanna asked in a low voice,

“Why do you think he did it? Do you think maybe he just wanted to explore?”

Suki shook her head. She didn’t think that was it at all. She was convinced that Dan had actually wanted out. He’d wanted to be free of his cage, but why? Well, she had a good idea about that too.

“I think I need to get my mum to take me back to the pet store.”

But when she told her parents this, they were having none of it.

“Suki, you need to show us you can care for one hamster before we let you get a second one,” her dad told her in his most serious parent voice.

“But I am caring for him, dad. He’s lonely. He needs his friend, or else he’s going to try to escape again.”

“Now that’s just silly,” her mum replied, giving her dad that look that always infuriated Suki. Just because she was a kid didn’t mean she wasn’t capable of reason. “You know the pet shop owner told us hamsters are fine living alone. You agreed with him, or don’t you remember?”

Suki clenched her fists at her side and took a deep breath, trying to stay calm.

“Yes, I remember, and I think he was right, but I think Dan is different. Don’t you remember, they had him in a cage with another hamster? And the owner said that was unusual?”

“It’s just a hamster, Suki,” her dad said, shaking his head and giving her a knowing smile. “You can’t assume it has feelings like you or me. It just got out of its cage because it’s an animal, and animals like to run free every now and then. Why don’t you buy him a hamster ball instead, so he can roll around and explore a bit?”

Suki was about to argue, but then she realized that if she agreed, that would mean a chance to go back to the pet shop and, maybe, somehow, buy the other hamster. She swallowed the angry retort that had sprung to her lips and nodded.

“Maybe you’re right. I have a little of grandma’s birthday money left. Can we go to the pet shop now?” She turned a pleading look on her mum.

“Oh, sweetie, I have a lot of errands to run today, but I think I can take you next weekend. How about that?”

It took biting her lip, and another deep breath, but Suki managed to say that she could wait until next weekend.

Back upstairs in her room, she went straight to Dan’s cage, which now had the top firmly duct taped down. Dan was back in his corner, on his pile of wood shavings. His food looked barely touched.

Suki got down on her knees in front of the desk, so that her eyes were level with the bottom of the cage. The hamster opened its eyes a little, and she could swear he was looking right at her, just like he had in the pet shop.

“Okay, Dan, listen. You have to make a deal with me. I’m going to get you your friend back. I promise.” She raised a finger in the air so that the hamster could see it, and then she made an ‘x’ over her heart. “I can’t go to the shop to get him for a whole week, though, so I need you to hold out for that long. Can you do that? You have to eat, and exercise, and not run away again for a week, and then I promise I’ll bring your friend to you. Deal?”

The hamster looked at her for just a split second longer, and then he closed his eyes again and rolled over so that all she saw was his furry, brown back. Did he understand? Could he understand?

All of a sudden Suki felt rather silly. Maybe her dad had been right after all. Dan was just a hamster, and there was no way he understood what she was saying or knew what her gesture had meant. Laughing nervously to herself, she swiftly jumped to her feet, brushed off the knees of her jeans, and went downstairs to see what was on tv.

**************************

All that week, Suki felt on edge. At school she had a hard time concentrating, as her thoughts returned over and over again to that still, furry form sitting in the corner of its cage back in her bedroom.

Every day she raced home from school, ignoring all her friends’ invitations to hang out, just so she could check on Dan and make sure he was still there. And every day he was, though he hardly seemed to leave his corner, and his food bowl stayed worryingly full. Still, at least he was there, and at least he was eating a little. He wasn’t going to starve, or she hoped he wouldn’t. Despite all her research, she wasn’t sure just how much a hamster needed to eat every day to stay alive. She just had to trust that Dan knew.

On Thursday during lunch, she and Alanna sat alone at a table together, talking over her plan to buy the other hamster.

“As long as I can make sure my mum stays distracted for about five minutes, I think I can just buy it really quickly,” she told Alanna as she grimaced at the unappetizing-looking sandwich that lay in front of her. 

“But how are you going to get it home without her seeing? And won’t she notice that you didn’t buy the hamster ball?”

Suki’s grimace turned into a scowl. How did Alanna always notice the holes in her plans?

“I guess I’ll just have to buy the hamster ball too. Hey!” She perked up as a sudden idea occurred to her. “I can buy the hamster ball and the hamster, and smuggle him out inside. As long as I keep the ball in the shopping bag, my mum won’t know there’s anything inside it!”

Alanna nodded slowly, and Suki could sense that in her mind she was prodding at the plan and looking for weak spots.

“That could definitely work,” she said. “As long as he doesn’t scrabble around inside and make a bunch of noise.” She paused, and then added, “You’ll just have to crinkle the bag a lot to cover the sound. But, um, do you actually have enough money left to buy both the hamster and the ball?”

Suki’s smile froze on her face. She had ten pounds fifty-six pence left from her birthday money. Dan had cost about eight pounds, so she assumed the other hamster would cost the same. She’d looked up the price of a hamster ball online, and the cheapest had cost three or four pounds. In other words, she was short.

She turned a panicked look on her friend, but Alanna just shook her head and reached into her pocket to pull out her wallet.

“How much do you need?”

Suki blushed, suddenly feeling warm all over. How did she get so lucky to have a friend like Alanna?

“Erm, if it’s not too much trouble, could I borrow a tenner? I don’t think I’ll need more than five, but just to be on the safe side…”

Her friend pulled a bill from her wallet and handed it to her with a smile.

“Thank you! Thank you so so so so so so much!” Suki gushed.

Alanna gave her a small bow, with an exaggerated flourish of her hand, and said, “Think nothing of it!” and all of Suki’s tension dissolved into a froth of giggles.

******************************

On Friday night, Suki was so nervous she could barely sleep. Before she had turned off the lights and crawled beneath the duvet, she had knelt in front of Dan’s cage again, just like she had almost a week ago. He was in his corner still, with his small back turned to her.

“I’m going to the pet shop tomorrow, Dan,” she told him. “I’m going to bring your friend back, just like I promised.”

Dan’s only movement was the slight rise and fall of his chest as he breathed. Without quite knowing why she did, Suki suddenly thought back to the day before, to sitting at the lunch table and giggling with Alanna. She thought of how wonderful her friend was, and how grateful she was to have her. And then she imagined how she would feel if one day some stranger came along and scooped her friend up and took her away somewhere. All at once, there were tears in her eyes.

“I’m so sorry, Dan,” she whispered. “I did a terrible thing to you, and I didn’t even realize it at the time. But I’m going to make it right. I really am.”

She thought she saw him move, just a little, as though maybe he was on the verge of turning to look at her again. But he didn’t. He stayed where he was, face buried under the wood chips. So Suki had gone to bed, and pulled the covers up over her eyes and tried to stop thinking and just fall asleep. It was a very long time before that happened.

She was even more nervous the next morning on the way to the pet shop. Her mother was right there beside her, asking her questions about Dan, like was he eating normally yet? Did he seem to like the fun accessories she’d added to his cage? Suki tried to give normal-sounding answers and hoped her mother couldn’t hear the edge to her voice. This was one time where a little absentmindedness on her mother’s part was exactly what was wanted.

Once they were inside the pet shop, Suki wanted to head straight back to the hamster cages, but she knew she needed her mother distracted. So instead she took the long way round, snaking past the little rooms holding kittens and puppies, and sure enough, her mum practically melted at the sight of all those roly-poly little fur balls. It wasn’t long before she was making incoherent little noises while pressing her nose up against the glass of one of the rooms.

As soon as she was sure her mother’s attention was occupied, Suki backed away as quietly as she could and headed for the aisle with hamster toys and accessories. It was a relief to discover that she could pick up a hamster ball for only three pounds. She could give Alanna most of her money back.

She grabbed the ball off the shelf, tucked it under one arm, and then high-tailed it to the end of the aisle where the cages stood. Yes, there were all the Syrians — she barely spared a glance for them this time — and down below, all the dwarf hamsters, and yes there was the cage Dan had been in before, with its sign that said, “Campbell’s Dwarf Hamster, Male.”

She dropped to her knees at once to peer into the cage…the empty cage. The bottom dropped out of her stomach. She peered closer. Maybe the little grey hamster was just in his hutch at the back. She leaned all the way to one side and craned her neck, trying to see inside the hutch…but it was empty too.

No, no. No no no. This couldn’t be happening. Frantic, she began searching all the other cages. Maybe they’d moved him? There were several other cages containing dwarf hamsters, even a few more Campbell’s, but no, that one was brown, and that one was grey, but too light, and the cage said female anyway. No. No, he wasn’t here.

She leapt to her feet and dashed up to the front desk, glad to see that the shop owner was there and not some other employee who wouldn’t know her.

“Ah,” he smiled when he caught sight of her. “The young lady who bought the Campbell’s. Already buying more accessories, I see.”

“Excuse me, Sir,” she panted when she reached the counter. “The other hamster, the one that was in the cage with Dan, where did he go? He isn’t in the cage anymore.”

“Oh, him.” The man’s smile faded a little, and Suki felt her heart stop. Please let him be alive. Please, she begged, not quite sure whom she was begging. “I sold him yesterday, to a very nice-looking boy and his parents, from the north side of town, you know.” Suki did know. That was the rich part of town. She didn’t know anyone who lived there. “I’m surprised they wanted him, though, considering how dull and sluggish he’s been lately.” The man’s expression turned disapproving, and Suki was suddenly so angry she wanted to slap him. Of course the little guy was sluggish! He was depressed, just like Dan was, and all because this shop owner didn’t know his animals well enough to realize that the two of them should never have been separated.

“Who was the boy? Where was he from? Can you give me his phone number?”

The man looked taken aback. Then he gave her that smile, that infuriating smile that adults reserve for children when they think they are indulging their silly, childish whims.

“Well, now, young lady, we do have that information on file, but I can’t just go around giving out people’s private information, now can I? That would be what is called an unethical business practice.”

Suki had to bite back a scream, but she managed to keep her voice low, if not exactly steady.

“Sir, it’s just that my hamster has been very sluggish too, and I think it’s because he misses the other one. They need to be back together. Could you please, please tell me the boy’s number, or even just his name?”

The man was shaking his head, and Suki could feel her heartbeat pounding in her ears.

“Okay, okay. Then, if I give you my name and number, could you call that boy and give him my information, and tell him to call me?”

The man opened his mouth, but Suki was never to hear his response.

“Excuse me, young lady, but who is it that you are planning to give out your name and phone number to?” Her mother’s voice, coming from just over her shoulder, had taken on a very sharp tone.

Slowly, Suki turned around, and when she met her mother’s disapproving glare, she swallowed hard.

“Erm, just the boy who bought the other hamster from Dan’s cage. Mr., er,” She turned to check the man’s name badge, “Mr. Reynolds here was just telling me that the other hamster had been very depressed too, before he sold him. I thought maybe I could talk to this boy and see if we could meet up, to let the hamsters see each other, and maybe then they wouldn’t be so sad.”

Her mother’s expression had started closing up almost as soon as Suki had started talking. She didn’t even have to open her mouth for Suki to know that she was going to say no. Before she’d had a chance to say it, though, the phone that hung on the wall next to the cash register began ringing, making them all jump. Mr. Reynolds reached for it at once and picked it up even before the second ring.

“Pets Galore, Reynolds speaking. How can I help you?”

While Mr. Reynolds listened to the voice on the other end of the phone, Suki’s mother rounded on her and began reading her a lecture on the stupidity of giving out one’s personal information to strangers.

“—so disappointed in you, young lady. I know you know better, after all the talks we’ve had with you about internet safety —“

But Suki was only half-listening. Something Mr. Reynolds was saying to the person on the phone had caught her attention.

“No, I’m very sorry we can’t give a refund without a return. Yes, I understand that you don’t have the hamster to return anymore, but—“ A long pause. “No, we don’t do replacements either. Now, if you would like to come in and purchase a new hamster—“ Another long pause. “I’m very sorry, madam, but I don’t see how the effectiveness of the cage design is the responsibility of the shop. I would recommend you contact the manufacturer—“

“Suki! You aren’t even paying attention to me!” Her mother’s voice had risen to harpy pitch, and Suki winced at the noise. “We’re going home right now, young lady, and your father and I are going to have a very serious discussion about whether we made the right decision letting you take on a responsibility like this.”

And then her mother’s hand was on her arm, and she was being dragged from the pet shop. As they passed through the front door, Suki could just hear Mr. Reynold’s voice behind her.

“Now, madam, at Pets Galore we are not in the business of selling defective hamsters, and the fact that you would even insinuate such a thing—“

She couldn’t make out the rest, but she had heard enough to kindle just the faintest flame of hope in her heart.

When they were back home, and Suki’s mum had told her dad all about what had happened, it was time for more lectures. When it was all said and done, Suki found that she had been grounded from the internet for a week, which she thought was probably the worst overreaction to anything in the entire history of parenting. 

By the time she had dragged herself up to her room, that tiny light of hope had died down to a half-charred ember. So the other hamster had escaped. So what? It was still miles away on the north side of town. How could one tiny hamster safely cross an entire town? And even if it could, there was no way it would know to come to Suki’s house. 

Once again, it struck Suki that maybe she was giving far too much credit to these hamsters. After all, they were tiny creatures with tiny brains. It really wasn’t very likely that they had enough reasoning ability to both plot an escape and plan a route to each other. And, really, maybe her parents were right after all. Maybe all of this about them being sad to be separated was all just a load of nonsense she had made up in her head. They were just a couple of hamsters, for goodness’ sake.

She was telling herself this as she pushed open her bedroom door and switched on the light. Her eyes went immediately to the cage where it sat on her desk. From here, it wasn’t too difficult to make out the tiny, brown body hunched up in the far corner. She shut the door behind her with a soft click.

Slowly she made her way over to the desk and knelt down in front of the cage again.

“Am I wrong about you?” she muttered to the unresponsive ball of fur. “Maybe this is all you wanted, after all.” She held up the shopping bag with the hamster ball in it, and then pulled the toy out and held that up so that the hamster could see, if it ever decided to turn around and look. “Did you just want out of that cage so you could roll around freely and see the world a bit?”

His chest rose and fell in that same quick, steady rhythm. Still no other sign of movement. She set the hamster ball down on the floor beside her with a sigh.

“I know I promised I would bring your friend back, but… I didn’t.” All at once the tears were there, filling her eyes and sealing off the inside of her throat. For a long moment it was impossible to say anything else. Then she took a deep breath, and swallowed, and went on. “I couldn’t. He was gone, your friend. They sold him to someone else.”

Tears were sliding freely down her cheeks now, and she swiped angrily at her snotty nose.

“I tried, Dan. I really did. I had a whole plan for how I was going to secretly buy him and then sneak him home for you. It just didn’t work.” The little back stayed there, motionless, in the same spot as always. Unable to look at him anymore, Suki leant her forehead against the edge of the desk and really started sobbing.

All she’d wanted was a hamster to love and care for. Just a little furry thing to call her own, and she would be his whole world, the most important thing to him. She was going to be the most devoted pet owner the world had ever seen, and buy him every thing his tiny heart could ever desire — except she couldn’t. She couldn’t get him the one thing he really seemed to want.

“He ran away, too, your friend,” she mumbled toward the floor, still not daring to look up at that sad, little form. “The shop owner told me he was sluggish all week, and then this boy bought him and took him to that fancy neighborhood in the north part of town. But then the boy’s mum called the shop today, just a couple of hours ago, to say that the hamster had gotten out of his cage and disappeared. I guess they didn’t find him right away, like I did with you. And now… Now he’s out there somewhere, wandering around out in the cold. And there are cars, and foxes, and cats and dogs, and poisonous food, and so many things that can kill a tiny, little guy like you. But at least he’s free, I guess…”

The sounds were so unexpected that Suki almost didn’t believe at first that she was hearing them — just a quiet rustling, just the sound of Dan moving about in his cage. Quickly, she raised her eyes, just in time to see the hamster roll over to face her. And once again, for the third time, he was looking at her. His small eyes were so black, and they glinted so brightly in the late morning sunlight. His pink nose was quivering, the whiskers on either side trembling slightly with the movement. Hamsters must have a very keen sense of smell, she thought, and then she wondered how far away they had to be from one another before two hamsters could catch each others’ scent.

“If you were free too, I bet you could find each other,” she murmured slowly to him. “I just bet you could.”

For a moment a wild thought entered her head, of slipping Dan into her pocket and sneaking out of the house, trekking all the way across town — she could probably take the bus? — and then setting him free somewhere in that neighborhood where she was pretty sure that boy lived. Pretty sure…but not absolutely positive. And then she remembered all those things she had listed before, all those dangerous things that could end Dan’s life.

She shook her head. No. Perhaps he was unhappy here, but at least he was alive. Right?

Suki consoled herself with that thought as she turned her back on the hamster and went back downstairs to start on her Saturday chores.

*****************************

That night, Suki had the strangest dream. She dreamt that she was small and covered in bright orange fur, and then a huge hand reached down and grabbed her up and put her in a plastic cage. On the other side of the clear plastic, a big pair of brown eyes watched her, and a voice spoke to her, making happy, unintelligible sounds. Filled with panic, she raced around the inside of the cage, following every tunnel, sliding through every opening, hoping against hope that somewhere she would find an exit, but every path seemed to lead her right back to the place she had started — in the center of a cage.

Eventually, the eyes and the voice disappeared, and then the world turned dark, and she felt a little sharper, her wits a little keener. She got an idea — she pushed all her wood shavings together in one corner and climbed atop them and then, leveraging every ounce of strength in her small body, she pressed up against the lid of the cage until At Last! it came free with a satisfying pop! Through the opening came a rush of cool, fresh air, and as she pulled it deep into her lungs, she felt the most exhilarating sensation she had ever known in her life — freedom!

She woke then. It was Sunday morning, very early, with the sunlight peeking bashfully from between scattered clouds.

Suki rolled over in bed, her eyes drawn at once to the cage on her desk. The tunnel on the side lay unscrewed beside the cage, leaving a large, round hole, plenty big enough for a dwarf hamster to crawl out. The trail of wood shavings led down the front of the desk this time and right towards her bedroom door. The cage itself was empty.

Suki smiled.

 

“Good luck, Dan.”

**Author's Note:**

> Originally published on tumblr


End file.
